Death in Salem Is Final

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Beware the wilds of New England.

By Nick Kolan

I get a lot of game announcements sent to me at IGN. They range from tiny little indie iPhone games up to sequels in massively popular franchises. We get so many that they begin to blur together, with so many games sharing the traits of so many others, into an indistinguishable mass of names and features. But sometimes one game jumps out of that mass like an evil doll in a bad horror movie, grabs you by the eyeballs, and begs for your attention (and if we're continuing this simile, begins stabbing you in the face). Salem might just be one of those face-stabbing games, although the actual face-stabbing content will be minimal.

The press release we received last week announced Salem as the working title for a free-to-play MMO set in a semi-fantastical 17th century New England, a "light-hearted gothic setting with a charming and cute art-style." Lead designer Björn Johannessen cites both H.P. Lovecraft and Tim Burton as inspirations for the style. What caught my eye was not the single piece of concept art included with the announcement, no. What caught my eye was the inclusion of permanent death -- the idea that if your character dies, that's it. There's no coming back.

It's something that only a few games have done, most notoriously Diablo II's hardcore mode. Anyone who has dabbled in games with a permanent death can attest that the more you play, the higher your fear of death grows, and the fewer the risks you're willing to take. That might just be the mentality that developer Seatribe is trying to cultivate.

Salem concept art.

Their previous game, Haven and Hearth -- a sandbox focus on crafting tools and surviving in a rough wilderness by building a shelter and cultivating food -- may very well be a good indication of what we can expect from Salem. In fact, it sounds like food is going to play a very important role. Rather than have your usual MMO stats, a character's primary attributes are the four cardinal humors of blood, phlegm, yellow bile and black bile, which, according to Johannessen, are leveled up "by eating various kinds of food. Better and more advanced foodstuffs allow you to level up faster and safer."

The stronger your humors, the stronger your character, and the less likely you are to die to when encountering game's more fantastical beasts (including Squonks and Hidebehinds), but death by other players will still be a risk. The game has open PvP, which means anyone can theoretically kill anyone else. But committing crimes leaves you very open to reprisal. "When you commit crimes you leave a stench of crime behind, which can be collected by anyone and used to track you down, summon you into the game -- even if you're offline -- and kill you," Johannessen says. "Death can be a harsh experience, but by and large I don't think it will be worth risking a developed character to kill newbies." Johannessen believes that this will keep players in check.

If you do die, that may not be the end of the road. Yes, that character is gone from the world for good, but their belongings may not be. "On death your character falls to the ground and you are kicked back to the title screen with the option of creating a new character. Your old character's corpse -- gear and all -- stays in the game world until natural decay removes it, someone buries it or it is otherwise disposed of," says Johannessen. "Any new character you create will have the option of staring as the 'legitimate heir' of your previous character, so your new character will probably be able to start by your old character's abode, and will be considered the owner of any land claims your old character had."

Of course, you may not have access to the skills and stats that your original character had. For an experienced player who has put hundreds of hours into a character, that could potentially be game-ending, with the time it would take to recoup the loss seeming insurmountable. Johannessen sees it differently, though. "Rather than being the reason people quit playing the game, I think that permanent death is what will make people start playing it in the first place. Death can be a harsh experience, but on the other hand it is also what makes the gameplay so meaningful." On the other hand, it could be a way of hitting the reset button on your character. Johannessen has stated that witchcraft will be featured in Salem as one of the two paths to magical abilities, and it doesn't seem farfetched that once you stray down one path, the other will be locked out. Perhaps the death of a character will let you explore the other side of that fence, providing a whole new game experience for players who tire of their first choice.

There's no official release window yet, or even an estimated beta-testing window, so we're a ways off from braving the rough wilds of colonial New England, but Salem seems like it could provide a unique challenge and may be worth paying attention to.

How do you feel about permanent death? Does it draw you in or do you prefer more room for error?